By Annemarie Mannion

Source Chicago Tribune

Hinsdale’s new tree ordinance may be revamped after village officials said they might want allow more circumstances to be considered when residents ask to remove a parkway tree.

The ordinance approved last summer imposes a $5,000 fee for removing a parkway tree with village permission and a $25,000 for removing one without village permission.

It requires residents to go to village staff first to get approval. The staff’s decision is based on whether the tree is diseased, dead, dangerous or declining. If the request is rejected, residents can ask the Environment and Public Services Committee, which acts as a tree board and has the ultimate power to make the decision.

Three requests to remove or relocate parkway trees were presented recently to the committee which, in a couple cases, considered ways to allow residents to find a way to bypass the hefty tree removal fee.

One resident, Thomas Mitchell, asked to remove two Douglas firs from in front of his house in the 500 block of West Seventh Street. He said he bought the house a year ago and has improved the exterior, but thinks the fir trees are unsightly.

He said he is not in a position to pay $10,000 to remove two trees, but offered instead to pay for constructing a portion of sidewalk in front of the house, which currently does not have one.

Though the trees don’t meet the conditions in the ordinance, committee members agreed they are unsightly, and said they might be willing to consider such an arrangement. They asked Mitchell to work with staff on a preliminary design for a sidewalk.

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By Dawn Rhodes

Source Chicago Tribune

Mary Ellen Young, Danielle Dittus and Paula Bowling took oaths of office for the DuPage County Regional Board of School Trustees Monday, but that doesn’t mean all of them will be allowed to serve. Though the three received the most votes, the Illinois School code prohibits Young and Dittus from serving side-by-side because both represent Downers Grove Township.

The board was obligated by state statute to swear in its newly elected members on Monday, though no local, county or state agency seems to have authority to resolve the issue created by the results of the April 9 election.

“We had certificates in hand, we swore in each of them,” said Laura Pollastrini, who was elected as president of the reorganized board. “Only time will tell.”

The stalemate emerged last month after Young and Bowling, of York Township, beat Christopher Jacks of Naperville Township for the two, full six-year terms. Then Dittus beat Jerry Allen of Milton Township for the unexpired four-year term.

“I think this had to happen before there could be a next step,” Regional Superintendent Darlene Ruscitti, ex-officio secretary to the board, said of the move to swear in the elected members. “It’s shining a light on where there are some gaps in the process.”

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By Sally Ho

Source Chicago Tribune

With a background on the Arlington Heights plan commission, newly appointed Trustee Robin LaBedz said she has a handle on the village’s overarching issues, but wants to dive more into direct services for residents.

LaBedz, 57, says she plans to tackle topics such as flooding and the emerald ash borer, two often-discussed village problems.

“Even with all the experience that I do have, there’s a lot still to learn,” she said after being sworn into office at Monday’s meeting.

LaBedz, though, has been there for key moments in recent village matters. The birth of Arlington Downs and the emergence of the redevelopment plan for the Hickory/Kensington neighborhood both took place during her six-year tenure on the village plan commission.

While she helped approve the full Hickory/Kensington redevelopment plan as a planning commissioner, LaBedz also draws from her experience as a member of the downtown master plan task force. She says she would support the idea of a tax increment financing district to fund the future neighborhood.

“I’m in favor of the redevelopment. I think the plan is good. I voted for it,” she said.

Meanwhile, the Arlington Downs development, which LaBedz said is among her proudest accomplishments, began construction this spring and is expected to be one of the largest projects in the village’s history.

LaBedz also is no stranger to some of the hot-button issues in the village, including matters like affordable housing and economic development.

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By Ed Mcmenamin

Source My Suburban  Life

Despite years of code violations and complaints, residents say a construction company based on a residential street has not reformed its behavior and serves as a general nuisance in an otherwise quiet area.

By Jerry Moore

Source My Suburban Life

For his first five years of living in Riverside, Scott Jansen endured five or six power outages lasting at least an hour every year.

Brian Urlacher, former Chicago Bears pro bowl linebacker, announced his retirement from the NFL today on Twitter. He entered the league as an immediate star, racking up eight sacks as the 2000 Defensive Rookie of the Year. He won the 2005 AP Defensive Player of the Year, and made four first-team All Pro teams.

Source: Sun Times
By Susan Frick Carlman

Call it thinking outside the meadow.

When planners sat down last year to take a fresh look at the concept of open space in DuPage County, they were prepared to aim their sights beyond sprawling expanses of green grasslands and forests — or perhaps nearer.

Steering committee member Bill Novack, director of transportation, engineering and development for the city of Naperville, said one of the possibilities tossed onto the table in those early discussions was the relatively tiny parcel southeast of Washington Street and the West Branch of the DuPage River where a dilapidated and long-vacant commercial building was razed earlier this year.

“They said, ‘Here’s an example that creates something a little different,’” Novack said. “It was interesting how they looked at things and said, ‘This is a place where possibly there could be another kind of use.’”

Partly because the eastern portion of DuPage lacks large pieces of undeveloped land, that approach is what was called for in the first comprehensive update to the county’s open space plan in more than 30 years. Committee members took a look at a variety of landscapes, including vacant lots and buildings, and sites that show potential for redevelopment or conversion into parks.

“Our mission is preserving land, and we’ve never abandoned DuPage County — although we’ve been told that there was no land left in DuPage County,” said Brook McDonald, president and CEO of the Naperville-based Conservation Foundation, which spearheaded the collaborative undertaking involving county municipalities, park districts and the Forest Preserve District. “We know that’s wrong.”

A new map released with the updated plan shows areas considered promising for the completion of trail networks and connections between existing public lands, including all of the area around the DuPage River from the Will County line north to the Fawell Dam on Naperville’s north side. A broad swath of open land southwest of 75th Street and Route 59 also is highlighted on the map.

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By: Anna Schier
Source: My Suburban Life

The saying goes that you don’t know someone until you’ve walked a mile in their shoes.

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By Naomi Nix

Source Chicago Tribune

Money, personnel and supplies have poured into Oklahoma from across the country after Monday’s devastating tornado, but one Chicago-area church is sending a different kind of assistance — a team of golden retrievers.

Lutheran Church Charities, which runs the LCC K-9 Comfort Dog Ministry, on Tuesday sent about six dogs and nine trained handlers from Illinois and Indiana to Oklahoma City. Two dogs and two handlers that worked in Joplin, Mo., after the 2011 tornado in that town will join them there.

The Addison-based nonprofit plans to make the dogs available for anyone affected by the tornado who wants to pet them and talk about their experience.

“They are good listeners and help people process loss and tragedy,” said the charity’s president, Tim Hetzner.

The dogs and their handlers were invited to help by Messiah Lutheran Church in Oklahoma City. The church plans to take the Illinois volunteers to The Children’s Hospital at OU Medical Center in Oklahoma City.

The group will also visit shelters in Moore, Okla., where most of the tornado’s damage occurred, and the University of Oklahoma’s campus in Norman in an effort to help tornado victims and first responders directly, said Messiah Lutheran Church’s senior pastor Mark Muenchow.

“People will still be fairly shellshocked,” Muenchow said. “The dogs kind of take their focus off of it for a moment and allow them to kind of share.”

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